


9 Crimes

by baunitchief (emeryazure)



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: F/F, Strong Language, i love putting major character death when referring to emily, it ain't that deep, just saying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-05
Updated: 2018-03-05
Packaged: 2019-03-27 09:14:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13877784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emeryazure/pseuds/baunitchief
Summary: JJ finds herself reeling after the events of the Taveras case, she finds herself sinking into the pitfalls of the past. She finds herself wondering if it all could have been different and where she went wrong. She breaks it down and figures up all her crimes of the past decade.for the "what if's and if only's" day of Jemily week.





	9 Crimes

Jennifer Jareau never thought she’d ever find herself here again. She wasn’t one to rehash the past, not after everything. She was sure somewhere, sometime after Emily Prentiss had left for London that she had dealt with it all. And yet here she was and she was reeling, that much she knew.

All that had happened in the past two days or maybe it was actually the last two years had managed to blindside not only her but everyone on the team. Not only that but it seemed to rip open old wounds that the blonde was sure she had securely healed and managed to compartmentalize. She had shoved her tiny compartments closed and set them ablaze. Just for everything to have them burst open and fall on her again, all the more heavy and to the forefront of her mind.

When she arrived home that night after learning that her unit chief, her friend, her… her friend had been put on administrative leave pending investigation it was nearly two in the morning. She was wondering around her house like a zombie but she was so lost in thought that she hadn’t even realized that she was doing it but she wanders still.

She was lost in thoughts of how she had managed to feed off distraction to get her through this past year. So much had happened that she really hadn’t let it all sink in. Was she honestly so detached these days that it didn’t even seem real? She doesn’t know how but now in the middle of a cold, dark night in D.C. she was letting it all really sink into her skin.

She finds herself in the bedroom first as she sets her go-bag down near the dresser and it’s mostly dark in the room. A far lamp left on because Will knew she was due home at some point that evening. She recognizes that the man is there, she’s not completely absentminded but she just hardly even notices anymore. It’s just routine, simple routine.

JJ gets as far as setting herself down on her side of the bed but once she does, she can’t even move. She just stares her eyes wide and her body stock still which leaves her all too aware when Will turns over from his sleeping position in realization of her arrival. She feels the hand reach out and touch the small of her back but she doesn’t process it. She’s never felt more disconnected than this moment right here, right now.

The southern man glances through the slits of his sleepy eyes, “Hey, chére, how was work?”

It’s a simple and absurd question at this point but it was routine. He should know the given answers by now; work was terrible, terrifying, traumatizing, exhausting, gut-wrenching, heartbreaking, soul crushing and was absolutely sucking the life out of her. But it’s the usual answers tonight, “It was… fine.”

“Yeah?” Will croaks as he was on his side again, back turned away from his wife. “Well, it’s nice to finally have you home after a week.”

She hears the slight inference in the man’s voice but it no longer bothers her or even affects her directly anymore. The blonde is pretty sure she’s bulletproof to the man’s frequent slights towards the hours of the job. He had been aware that she was working the Taveras case here in DC before she had been shipped off to New Orleans, JJ doesn’t miss the irony in that and she’s sure Will hadn’t either. Yet he had nothing to do with either, the fact that she was working so closely with her husband’s own department at Metro PD and somehow managed to never even see the man once on the job was not lost on them.

“Yeah, well, you better get used to it,” JJ murmurs, it’s audible but quiet as the man grumbles slightly from his side of the bed. “It’s only gonna get worse.”

“Did something happen?” Will lazily asks, half awake and starting to doze off again. She figures it doesn’t really matter. Not much could be worse for them anyways.

“I got promoted, well, kind of,” JJ offers and Will huffs a sigh. “I’m acting Unit Chief.”

“That’s great, honey,” Will mumbles and with that he is back off to sleep and JJ is left alone with the ferocity of her thoughts to keep her company. She was fine with that because honestly she was happier to be alone in her thoughts than alone together with the man who was supposed to be her other half.

JJ briefly checks in on her sons but finds herself unable to linger there with thoughts and guilt finding and weaving their way through. The blonde thinks about that William Faulkner quote she had read at Georgetown, “All of us labor in webs spun long before we are born.” It nearly eats her alive when she thinks about her boys. She understands how intrusive thoughts work though; she had experienced them enough with her post-traumatic stress. But this wasn’t exactly traumatic though, was it?

She thinks if anything she had willed the trauma upon herself. How many lies had she told that ended up tangling her further into the web? She can’t even keep track of them anymore. Well, she can to an extent. As she ends up on the couch in the dead silence of the house that didn’t even feel like a home anymore, she thinks the silence will eat her alive. The booming voices of the thoughts in her mind could deafen her but she chooses to indulge them tonight, as if she could even ignore them.

How long had she been telling and living these lies? She calculates it to eleven years, back when Emily Prentiss had shown up in her life. She had even lied to herself about how she initially felt about the dark agent from the get-go. She hadn’t readily admitted to herself the intense attraction between the two of them even though it had always been there.

It didn’t help that JJ was already feeling like she was alone, not that it was anything new and she didn’t know why she felt this way exactly. She had a loving and mostly supportive husband and two boys but things always seemed to unravel and the emptiness only seemed to amplify in the presence of the dark-haired woman.

She couldn’t shake the feeling that Will was no longer a lover but a friend, a friend who she leaned on for support at times and who helped raised her boys. She can’t even remember the last time they truly connected physically. She knows Will wasn’t ridden with the same guilted gut feeling that she was when they were intimate. She knows that he didn’t experience the same out-of-body, out-of-mind experience. She no longer felt committed, mind, body and soul. Hell, she’s not even sure that she ever was.

It’s true that she had already recognized that her and Will only ended up together by a fluke. She always trusted her gut and her gut had been telling her to call it quits after that first year of flirty, fucking and fun. Her gut said run but she could never regret having her boys. She never had the guts to ruefully and almost sadistically thank Emily goddamn Prentiss for cold-shouldering her quite literally into Will’s arms. She didn’t feel grateful however, she wished she could but she feels nothing but empty.

She realizes that the word ‘run’ had never quite escaped from her gut or from the back of her head. It’s why it took four damn years for her to agree to marry the guy and even that, she admits, was a fluke. Their marriage in her mind was no doubt a scam. It had been rushed and fueled entirely by adrenaline, mostly by the thought of losing Emily to Interpol and of Henry losing his father so she clung desperately to him as if a marriage was somehow going to keep him alive and well for her son.

She remembers hearing Rossi’s question to Will as she went to get ready for their wedding. Something she doesn’t think about often but if she was unlocking compartments this was a big one.

_So, nervous?_

_Only if she doesn’t come back down._

Had he known too? He had to know somewhere deep down her heart wasn’t in it either. That perhaps it never truly had been. She had been very distant from him a lot of times, he had chalked it up to the job and it had yielded a lot of arguments, discussions and just long, drawn out conversations that JJ never felt were necessary. Truthfully her heart had belonged to someone else for just a bit longer than Will had come believe it belonged to him.

She can literally break down her time with Emily like a crime scene, like multiple gruesome, bloody scenes because that is simply all their escapades were, right? Simply crimes committed against a man who never deserved them. She finds the guilt again seeping through and she tries her best to think of this objectively. Just like a crime scene.

She thinks about those first few months with Emily and just how entranced she was. The magnificent, tall, dark and mysterious masterpiece that JJ loved to unlock and weave the pieces of the puzzle together, no matter how long it took. Emily Prentiss was the best damn case that Jennifer Jareau had ever encountered. And she hates to admit just how long that it took her to get a lead and crack it open. She had resigned herself to the fact that she might never solve it.

She had been helplessly infatuated in the first few months. It had seemed all too daunting at first so she had been easily distracted by another. It was light, it was fun and it was all very Prentiss in its non-committal status. But all the things that they had come to witness and experience together by the end of that first year made things all the more heavy. Time spun in such a hurry in her presence but slowed in thoughts of her.

She knows the exact moment when she became infatuated by this woman, somewhere in the middle of the Hankel case. That was a case that would come to change JJ’s life without her ever realizing it. She was no longer simply a media liaison, not when she had to fire her gun and kill those dogs. Not when she couldn’t snap out of it until Emily’s voice came through her ears. Not when she never understood how Emily could be so calm and collected in the madness of their jobs. Hell, JJ had been so on edge she nearly drew her weapon on the woman. Yet Prentiss was still as even as ever.

She, of course, knew why now, they all did. There was certainly no desk job and there were bigger secrets that would come to threaten to take Emily Prentiss down. She couldn’t have known that then, none of them could. So really their little interactions those first few years could certainly be seen as lies, JJ wasn’t the only one who had committed the crimes that came to haunt her now.

Maybe the biggest one was when they were all in Miami and where Will had decided to show up again. She had hopes that she could keep their secret but it seemed to not exactly be the best kept one. But when Charles Luvet was killed for being who he truly was and it became apparent that the unsub was killing these men and taking their identities simply because he couldn’t accept the simple fact that he was gay. That had tripped JJ up and she couldn’t feel the concern she knows she should’ve for Will and maybe that was because she was struggling with what she knew to be true about herself.

When she broke up with Will, maybe it was cruel and maybe it was harsh. But it was the first real thing she had allowed herself to do in so long. It was the first thing that had made her feel alive. When Will asked if she was seeing another guy it had truly made her scoff at the idea but what had genuinely surprised her had been the guilt that made its way to her throat. There wasn’t another guy but only one image of one person popped in her head. There was another person, just not the way he thought.

She and Will had said their goodbyes and although it was a little bittersweet, she didn’t regret it, not at all. She was happy and content to let him go back home and live his life unimpeded by her. She knew that he would only want her to be happy and that’s what she was choosing now. Or so she thought until a certain brunette decided to come up and throw her own two cents in on the matter.

Emily Prentiss was the brightest damned star in her galaxy and JJ spun out in her orbit, nearly burned up in the heat of it all. She never could entirely make out the matter that such a woman was made of at the time. She came to realize this too late, much too late and hindsight is in fact 20/20. _Thanks, Dr. Reid._ So when that moment came all those years ago, she couldn’t understand the implication entirely.

_You should go for him._

_What?_

In retrospect it seemed such a childish response to the woman she loved telling her to go for someone else, unknowingly but also, entirely knowing.

_You’d make a cute couple._

It was such a general observation, she realized once again much too late. It was laced with inference but she didn’t know because she didn’t know that Emily knew the history then. That everyone knew that she and Will had been a thing for nearly a year. She also realizes the weight of the wrong in her response to something seemingly trivial now.

_You know what?_

Why did she always have to be the competitive type? Why did she have to take everything as such a damn challenge all the fucking time? She could kick herself now. She took this as Emily challenging her to go for it, like she wouldn’t dare and JJ stupidly always went all in on dares. She met her apparent challenge head on and thus JJ set up her own obstacle course for the other woman to complete as if just daring her to try and run it. This would come to be the biggest mistake and the biggest crime.

She should have seen Emily giving her the option, the one that the brunette ignorantly thought she wanted. JJ wanted to play Emily’s game and for a while she thought she was. Only it was never a game and it certainly wasn’t one that the older woman ever believed she could win. She hadn’t realized in doing this that she’d folded. She had made the wrong move. She didn’t say the wrong words, no.

 _You know what?_ That line shouldn’t have ended with JJ rolling her eyes and running into Will’s arms. No, that should’ve been followed by JJ turning back and staring into the eyes of the woman she loved and facing her toe-to-toe, finally finding the bravery that she had lacked her entire life. JJ realized that that bravery wouldn’t come for many, many years. And she had one hell of a poker face.

It’s been over ten years and it’s all she can think about now. A decade shadowed in pure cowardice.

Then her life spun even farther out of her control because ending up pregnant had not landed on Jennifer Jareau’s to-do list at the time but it had happened. She knew that she was in deeper with Will than she had ever planned to be. But it’s the way of things, she supposes, life makes plans that you’re not always in on. And this was a prime example.

Despite everything that had happened, ending up pregnant, Will moving to DC at the time, she still couldn’t get one person out of her head. One person who had been there, or at least tried to be there in the hardest of times only for JJ to shove her away again out of fear. God, does she regret not ever letting the woman in, not letting her experience what could’ve been a beautiful thing for them both.

She remembers the moment that her emotions, albeit pregnant or not, had gotten the most of her. It had been after Cyrus and the Separatarian Sect had taken Emily and Reid. After she had returned from the compound, how she had held the older woman for an almost unbearable and inappropriate amount of time. She had clung and cried, wept at the thought of what the dark haired woman had just gone through. Mostly she wept at the thought of a life without the other woman.

Many chalked it up to the hormones and the pregnancy at the time. So had Emily, she’s sure until in the cold dark of the night with a fire flaming feet from their position, JJ landed a shy but sure kiss upon warm, bloodied lips. It had to have been in the heat of the moment, of course. It was absolutely ridiculous to think otherwise.

JJ could choke on the feeling rising in her throat at all the emotions she had put into that first kiss for it to never even be acknowledge for much too long. Silence and secrets and compartments were the arts that Emily Prentiss was mastered in, JJ would come to discover. They entirely made up the flames of the woman who was like the sun that seared her so often. She would soon enough become a sort of apprentice of them without even realizing it. She would fall in, burn up in her atmosphere and explode into some form of star due to them.

After that kiss, JJ had been marked but she didn’t shine yet. Soon after, everything stopped. JJ’s world became a whirlwind with the birth of Henry. Not that the whirlwind of emotion when it came to Emily ever stopped but it was dulled to an ache for a while when it came to her son’s need above all else. Even if she had tried to pry open doors after that, it would be useless, a loss cause as Emily had all but shut and barred them away. JJ wondered if Emily prayed that they would never be opened or if she was just waiting for them to be kicked down. It seemed futile either way.

Those doors were entirely sealed by the death of Matthew Benton, the old friend from Rome. That was as much as most of the team knew. JJ, as well as the team, had always had an idea that Rossi knew more than he was letting on about that particular case but no one thought to push. The passion with which he sought the case was almost on par with Prentiss while the bureaucracy merely bartered.

So she found herself strolling into Rossi’s office late the night of Father Paul Silvano’s arrest and deportation. She remembers it readily. They were silent for a moment and Rossi’s eyes were lingering curiously over the blonde, trying to figure out the reason for her presence and her cause for pacing about the room.

“JJ, it’s late,” Rossi observed but couldn’t help but ask the inevitable. “Why aren’t you at home with Will and Henry, right now?”

JJ stopped her feet from rutting themselves into the carpet finally and sighs, “Just finishing up some paperwork from the case, we’ve got to cross our T’s and dot all our I’s on this one.”

“I agree, the Italian government doesn’t take lightly to us interfering with their business,” Rossi said. “But that could’ve waited until morning… Take a seat and tell me what’s really on your mind?”

She hesitated but took the offered seat in front of the older man’s desk. She couldn’t help but rub at her eyes at the time; feeling tired and worn down was too often her state of being those days. “I just- Do you think Emily’s going to be alright?”

“I don’t know that I can answer that, JJ,” Rossi stated matter-of-factly but the look of concern on his face was still present. “Why aren’t you asking Emily this?”

“She left at the scene and has probably gone home by now,” JJ stated obviously. “You know this, Rossi.”

“Yes but cars and cellular devices do exist,” Rossi quipped with a smirk. “So what’s the real reason you came traipsing into my office at eleven o’clock at night?”

“You know, ever since I got back, she hasn’t exactly been very open with me, I guess?” JJ struggled for an explanation that didn’t reveal the fact that she’s madly in love with the woman. “I don’t think it’s on purpose but I’ve just felt her pulling away from me.”

“She’s your friend, right, JJ?” Rossi asked the obvious with a raised eyebrow.

“She’s my best friend, Rossi,” JJ tried to say evenly but she’s almost certain it came out defensive.

“And Emily just lost one of her oldest friends,” Rossi stated. “Last time I checked friendship goes both ways and she certainly could use one right now. We know she doesn’t have many people outside of this office so if you’re worried about her why don’t you talk to her?”

JJ sighed, she knew he was right. She had no reason to hide the fact that she cared and was concerned about a friend but the problem more laid in the fact that Emily had never felt like just a friend. “You’re right, I’m gonna head out and give her a call.”

“That’s my girl,” Rossi says with a smile and one last drop of his pen to his desk. He groans as he looks at his clock. “I guess it’s about time for me to head out too if I’m going to be of any use at all tomorrow.”

And just like that they went their separate ways with JJ feeling no better about the situation. She recalls feeling like cement had set itself in her stomach and she had lingered far too long on the little green button on her cell before pulling out of the bureau parking lot. She found herself lost in thought as she drove and as she pulled in front of the woman’s building, she found her body making decisions for her that her mind had not entirely agreed upon. Someone walked out of Prentiss’ building and she caught the door quickly. She made her way to Emily’s front door with no problem; the problem being that her body had suddenly frozen up on her.

 _Just a friend checking on a friend, there’s nothing wrong with that,_  she thought to herself at the time as her fingers made a fist and her knuckles found the cool metal of the door. The knock seemed to jar whatever remaining reservations she’d had away. When the older woman finally made it to the door and opened it, JJ found the wind knocked out of her.

Her friend definitely looked worse for wear and run down. Her nearly jet black hair was still damp from the snow outside; eyes drooping slightly with dark circles dragging them under and dried blood was still remaining just at the edges of her nostrils that not many people would’ve picked up on. The crimson a stark contrast against her pale skin and dark mane had made JJ’s heart race. If she thought she knew the meaning of the word okay then Prentiss’ current state certainly wasn’t it.

“JJ, what are you doing here?” Emily’s voice was heavy and tired, deepened through nights without sleep. Her brow furrowed with a restlessly curiosity that JJ figured her’s mirrored as well.

“I just wanted to make sure that after everything that you were really alright,” JJ said slowly but she shook her head. “I guess I got my answer.”

“Why aren’t you at home with Henry?” _That’s just the question of the night, isn’t it?_ “Will’s got to be worried about you.”

JJ shook her head suddenly, unable to take the woman bothering to worry about _her_ and her _boyfriend_. She also couldn’t shake the tiny tinge of guilt that always comes laced with the man’s name.

“As far as Will knows, I’m still working the case,” JJ, in retrospect, doesn’t know why she had to be so honest while also being such a liar. Sure, she always held her emotions on her sleeve when it came to the older woman but she couldn’t pretend for just that night?

“JJ, why would you lie about something like that?” Emily asked the obvious, almost admonishingly so. But it was also the truth. It had been a lie, one she had made without even a second thought. Why couldn’t she just tell her boyfriend that she was checking on her friend who was having a rough time? _That’s because she was never just a friend._

“I just thought- I didn’t want him to worry, I guess,” JJ shrugged and Emily narrowed her eyes at her.

“And being on a case makes him worry less?” That was the moment that Jennifer Jareau realized she wasn’t exactly making sense.

“Emily, what happened?” JJ asked, having to intentionally ignore the logic that always ran as a constant from that Prentiss mind. It was such a general question that could spring answers out like blood from a shotgun wound.

But Emily, however, just rolls her eyes slightly and shrugs and takes the easy way out, she was an expert at this, “I just got a nose bleed from all the dry air, its fine.”

“You’re not fine,” JJ said boldly but the air caught in her throat, keeping her from speaking further.

“I am,” Emily doesn’t relent but suddenly there’s no longer just a hint of blood but a stream making its way to meet the red of her lips.

“Emily,” the words came out as barely a whisper but they might as well have been an explosion to the brunette who recoils, suddenly feeling exposed in vulnerability with the intimacy of the moment.

“JJ, you should go home to your family,” Emily said quickly, cuttingly while covering her nose bleed like it was never there. “Goodnight.”

“No! Hey!” JJ exclaimed as Emily went to close the door on her, reaching out just in time to stop it. “You are my family, Emily and you’re hurting.”

The words fell so naturally from her lips and she knew exactly what she had meant by them. They weren’t entirely ambiguous words for anyone who knew the unit. Everyone knew they had the reputation of being more like a family than a team but still, JJ realizes just how wrong these words were for someone like Emily Prentiss. Emily Prentiss didn’t have a family, not really.

“I’m fine, JJ, really,” Emily fought politely but JJ knew the woman better to know that she was practically begging to keep every last shred of dignity that she had left.

“Will you ever let anyone help you?” JJ nearly wants to slap herself in hindsight at the emotion in her voice and the tears in her eyes as she said this.

“JJ, honestly, you will leave it and me alone if you know what’s good for you, alright?” Emily said and with one final warning glare, shuts the door and what felt like essentially JJ out of her life at the time.

That was close to the makeup of JJ’s friendship with Emily for years following that night, two years to be exact. JJ would push and Emily would either push back or completely shut down. Even if JJ felt brave enough to change the course of her relationships, it seemed that Emily Prentiss wasn’t even on the map. To keep things civil and appearances heightened, JJ tried to be there for her friend whenever a new love interest entered the picture. She would be the friend that Emily had tried to be all those years ago, gently encouraging her friend to _go for it_.

When Emily was asked out by Mick Rawson, JJ tried to be that friend. She didn’t miss when her friend was trying to find any excuse to _just not_ , saying something about work schedules. JJ had innocently argued back that her and Will make it work and Emily had simply replied, _Oh_. No longer did JJ let her mind run wild with reasons behind that comment or that infamous Prentiss dead stare.

They were interrupted by Garcia however. JJ couldn’t help but be grateful when they were called into the BAU shortly after, Emily’s comment of _Maybe I should get a cat_ had all but solidified JJ’s suspicions and Emily’s resolve. The dark haired woman was married to the job and nothing had changed.

Sure, it’s honorable being dedicated to the job the way she was but JJ knew that no happy endings were ever made in a job where dead bodies were endless and they searched for madness in every person they met. JJ had found a sense of calm in her home life with Will and Henry, most people would probably find it maddening themselves trying to manage a job filled with overtime and a toddler but JJ was so surrounded by insanity that it was almost normal for her.

Then the job offer came in. The one that Strauss was determined to convince the liaison was a better option for her – was stable. JJ thought nothing worse than stable would throw her controlled chaos into complete disarray. She remembers that last case before leaving, it was all too rare to have a happy ending to a situation like Kate’s but it did happen on occasion. She remembers trying to channel some of Kate’s courage in writing that exit interview, in talking and saying goodbyes to the rest of the team.

As she approached the bullpen, tears already tracing her eyes – it was Emily’s broken and discordant small little _no_ that landed the world on her shoulders so she tried to focus on Morgan and Reid. They would be the stable ones. Derek would be bewildered but not show his emotion and Reid would be too busy in his confusion, trying to quantify some kind of equation that would’ve landed her in this position.

She knew Emily would be the one to truly see this as it was, a hopelessly lost cause and that was confirmed when JJ chanced a fleeting look at those dark eyes, already lining with liquid. All this was confirmed by the older woman’s almost rhetorical question, _So… we do nothing?_

JJ couldn’t hold her gaze when she said the words, _It’s done_. The blonde felt that those words went so much deeper for her and the other woman and maybe in that moment they did.

She notices it doesn’t take long before the brunette is no longer able to look at her either. The slight scoff and eye roll was so typical Prentiss that JJ hated it at the moment that it happened because it was her tell and it told her truth. _You’re too good. That’s the problem._

As Rossi speaks, she grasps another glance at the brunette as she noticed the sobering look on her face. JJ could almost read it, it was nearly regret before Emily clenched her jaw and let her eyes bounce unseeingly around the room. At Spencer’s innocent words, _take you away_. That’s the moment she felt the older woman was already attempting to compartmentalize her loss.

When concluding her exit interview, JJ tried not to let the dark woman seep into her mind, because she had thought about the entire team as she wrote but there was no one except Emily present in her thoughts as she penned the words: _There are things we don't want to happen, but have to accept. Things we don't want to know but have to learn. And people we can't live without but have to let go._

She had avoided everyone’s stares and the pitying emotions that laced their features for her short remaining days at the BAU but she got through it. It took the rest of the week and the entirety of the weekend for JJ to process everything but when she was pulled into a meeting at the State Department first thing the following Monday, everything changed in that moment. The word _Afghanistan_ barely processed as a place and a country and an assignment.

That night she had told Will yet another lie that it was taking a little longer for her to get settled than she thought. Instead, she found herself once again driving nearly without thought because everything was happening so damn quickly without her even having a say so. She found herself at the apartment again – _her_ apartment. She let herself in just as easily as she had two years prior. No hiccup of hesitation in her step because this is what she needed and this was who she needed.

And there was absolutely no hesitation from the brunette who swept her inside the door quickly with the simple words, “JJ, what are you- come in, come in.”

She thanked whoever and whatever that there was no fight in the older woman on this particular night. Maybe Emily was just relieved at the fact that JJ wasn’t gone, that she was right here and still with her. But JJ knew the feeling wouldn’t last. She was led into the kitchen where Emily made them both a glass of wine but she had paced so much that she found herself combing the carpets of the living room.

She knew she had deep brown eyes nervously tracing every step that she took as the brunette set one of the wine glasses down on the coffee table and then took a seat on the couch, JJ bringing her own glass to her lips to ease the tension. “So how was your first day?”

 _God_ , such a routine question for a day that was anything but as JJ’s world had been irrevocably turned upside down in less than a week, day, a single hour. She couldn’t find her voice quite yet to put that into perspective so she stayed quiet. And Emily, luckily, wasn’t much one for patience when it was necessary, “Alright, JJ, what’s going on? This isn’t like you.”

“How can everything change so fast, Em?” the words came uttered in sheer disbelief.

“What do you mean?” And as soon as the words had left her mouth, she sees Emily realize and read in JJ’s body language that nothing was quite as it seems. The blonde was not quite aware how at the time but she now knows that Prentiss knew all the signs all too well. “You got your assignment… What is it?”

“I- I can’t,” JJ says quickly before realizing that that wasn’t truly an explanation. “It’s classified.”

“Wow,” Emily draws out the word in a mocking tone. “You sound like Brad, the FBI agent.”

“Em, I’m serious,” and boy, was JJ drop dead serious and she knew the other woman had picked up the stress in her tone and turned stoic. “I mean I actually cannot tell you and I’m- I’m leaving tomorrow.”

“Okay, look, I get it,” Emily’s eyes had never been so sincere and JJ couldn’t quite understand in that moment but she knew that there was nothing but truth behind those dark eyes. “I just- how bad?”

“It’s bad, like top level security clearance bad,” is all JJ can articulate and she scolded herself for sounding more like Penelope than herself in that moment.

“Like being sent to a warzone kind of bad?” Emily asks but it’s more a statement and JJ finally stops her pacing, her fingers that had been anxiously ringing themselves around her wine glass still. She had just told the profiler that she was correct without even saying a word. “They’re really pulling no punches, huh?”

“Em, _I fucking can’t_ ,” JJ says through gritted teeth cause honestly all she wanted to do was just burst into tears and cry and tear into Emily every damn fear that she was trying her best to keep at bay.

“Alright, I won’t pry anymore,” Emily finally sets her wine glass down on the table with finality and stands to meet the blonde where she stood stock still. “You know I’m just a phone call away, and so is the rest of the team.”

Why didn’t that feel like enough this time? JJ takes the brunette’s hands that had found her biceps and interlaces them both together, “Em, I just can’t leave feeling the way I feel.”

“Hey, what’s going on?” Emily asked, genuinely concerned and of course, she was. JJ can’t remember ever having to come to the woman like this, just a complete and utter wreck. “You know you can tell me anything, alright?”

JJ meets her eyes for a moment and laughs a humorless laugh in the face of such irony.

“Okay, maybe not _everything_ but close enough,” Emily says with a defeated roll of her eyes and an awkward smile lacing her features.

“That kiss…” JJ lets herself trail off, lost in the thought of that beautiful yet haunting memory. She knows the brunette was playing coy and forgetful, just dumb enough. “And don’t tell me you don’t remember what I’m talking about because I know you do, okay?”

Emily took a deep breath and sighed, “I might not have Reid’s memory and I might’ve been in shock at the time but yeah, I couldn’t just forget something like a colleague kissing me after I was kidnapped.”

“Good because I want you to know that it wasn’t just a spur of the moment thing, ever,” JJ relayed the message she’s been trying to get out for years in just barely above a whisper, not trusting her own voice. “Unless that moment has literally lasted for the last four damn years, which seems highly unlikely.”

“JJ, what-” it’s Emily who now doesn’t trust her own voice, her own words, stopping short in confusion.

“It was always you and never Will,” JJ shook her head defiantly just to prove her point. “And when you told me to go for it all those years ago, I made the biggest mistake of my life not going for what and who I _actually_ wanted.”

“JJ, don’t say that,” Emily stepped away and dropped JJ’s hands. It was her turn to nervously pace a little now. “What about Henry?”

“I was already pregnant before that case in Miami,” JJ said seriously. “It wouldn’t have mattered at that moment because I already had my son but I made the wrong choice that day, I naively thought that this was some game at first with you and me but now here we are and all I know is that I’ve lost.”

“I thought that he was what you wanted,” Emily confirmed JJ’s suspicions that she had done it out of pure selflessness and not the other way around. How could JJ be so stupid to ever think otherwise? “It had been going on for a year and we just needed you to admit it.”

“It wasn’t ever serious for me,” JJ shoo her head, not quite believing her own words. “Until Miami, Will and I were casual at best but he- he felt something deeper and I thought maybe I could too but I don’t know. I was scared.”

“Of me?” Emily finally brought the topic back around with a raise of her eyebrow.

“Yes, of you,” JJ let out exasperatingly. “I couldn’t read you and sometimes… I still can’t. You’re a goddamn Prentiss; you’re too damn evasive for your own good.”

Emily opens her mouth as to start to say something, a denial possibly but her tongue denies her.

“Like now, I just told you something I’ve been holding in for four years and I can’t read a thing that you’re thinking and feeling,” JJ sighed, nervously ran her hand over her brow. “Was this a mistake?”

“No, no, JJ, I-” the older woman started but realized she doesn’t quite know what to say. “I’m really, really terrible at this.”

“I can see that,” JJ said with a lift of her eyebrow and a nervous smirk.

It’s then that something changes in Emily. Her demeanor ever so slightly shifting from an anxious, hovering mess to straight-laced as some kind of confidence comes back to her. She turns somber and serious as she approaches JJ. Her hands go to the sides of the blonde woman’s face, wiping a stray hair away from her features, a brief glance at JJ’s lips and then back to her blue eyes. Then Emily Prentiss kisses her like she’s never been kissed in her life.

That was the moment that she realized that maybe this woman wasn’t an entire sun but instead some kind of black hole because with the way she was sucking JJ in with just a touch was beyond gravity, she theorized. Yes, a black hole that JJ wouldn’t so much mind having ravage her. But just as soon as Emily Prentiss holds her impossibly tighter, she just as firmly is shoving her away.

“JJ, you have a fam-family and you are leaving tomorrow,” Emily says matter-of-factly as she rubs at lips as to rid herself of JJ’s taste and scent. “We cannot do this, I cannot do this.”

“Tell me you don’t want this,” JJ simply pleads.

“What I want doesn’t matter,” and just like that JJ knew that she lost her again. Emily goddamn Prentiss was stubborn as hell and it was just another one of those moments. “What matters is what’s best for your family; you should be at home and spending your last few hours here with them.”

JJ sighed, in some fucked up way she knew that Emily was right but it didn’t mean she didn’t have to absolutely hate it with everything within her. She sat down defeated on the couch, “None of this is what’s best for them. I’m not even what’s best for them.”

“No, no, you don’t get to do that,” Prentiss said sternly, shaking her head in the negative. “You don’t get to sell yourself short like you’re not the most loving and dedicated mother I know, take it from me cause I had a shitty one. Do you make mistakes? Yes because you’re human. Do you have a job that can feel all consuming? Yes but I know you and you never let it get that far because you go home to that little boy and you see all that’s good and pure in this world.”

To say JJ was startled by Emily’s long winded rant was an understatement but she couldn’t help the smile tracing her lips, “Did you just fucking profile me?”

“Yes, I did,” Emily said a just a hint of a smile touching the edges of her lips before it disappeared completely all too soon for JJ’s liking.

“Then tell me I’m wrong and that some part of you doesn’t want at least a little of what you just described,” it was desperate, JJ knows but she needed truth, openness and honesty more than ever.

“Jennifer, listen to me very carefully, I could give you a laundry list of things I want to share with you, okay?” the brunette offered gently. “But that doesn’t changes the fact that you are about to walk into a very dangerous situation and I need to know that you’ve got your head entirely screwed on straight. You need to come back home and then maybe we can figure this out but right now, I need you to go in with a clear head. I need you to do that for yourself and for your son, for Henry. Just forget anything and anybody else because I can’t and won’t be the reason we lose you, do you understand that?”

JJ’s tears had slipped out in some interval during the other woman’s monologue and she couldn’t stop the words that practically blurt subtly out of her mouth, “I love you so much, do you know that?”

“I’m afraid that I do and I’m even more terrified that I feel the same way,” Emily said as her eyes bounce nervously around the room now. “But I’m gonna be here, no matter what happens.”

“I’m fucking scared too, Em,” JJ confirmed, switching gears from a woman who’s personal and professional life felt like they were in all but shambles to shaky and unsure of her own abilities.

“I know, I know,” Emily said so softly, JJ didn’t so much as hear them as feel them in her soul as she was being pulled into an embrace by the other woman. “But I believe in you and you’re one of the strongest people I know. Come here.”

The two women embraced for what seemed like forever, it was probably only a few minutes if JJ had to calculate it but it meant the world to her at the time. It calmed the storm that had set in her stomach if only momentarily. But just as soon the calm had set in, the storm of reality hit like lightning.

JJ had followed Emily’s directions to a tee. She had spent the time with her family, she had held Henry so close that she felt that she could never let go but when Will tried to hold her just as close, she couldn’t help but feel the expanse. The only connection she felt to this family lay solely with her son and JJ was fooling herself to think otherwise but she couldn’t focus on that.

Not when she had landed in Afghanistan and all sense and reason seemed to go out the door. Now all of it seems like a blur, coming back to her only in fragments, filtering through what JJ could only figure is some kind of post-traumatic stress filter. She barely even remembers her brief trip home.

She couldn’t help but feel after the conversation with Emily before she left that anytime or intimacy spent with Will was a lie, it nearly felt like cheating which was absurd to an extent. Why did it feel like Emily was the one she was cheating on? Her head was backwards. She spent a little bit of time with Garcia and Prentiss together while she was home but never anytime that was just set aside for her and Emily. Will and Henry had occupied most of that time and space understandably.

When she got back to Afghanistan, only to have a physical and find out she was pregnant, that had come as a shock. She had told Cruz that her and Will had been trying but it wasn’t the truth. It was another happenstance in a laundry list of coincidences that had kept her and Will afloat. She was happy, of course. She was excited at the prospect of another child, overjoyed in fact but something wasn’t right and she could feel it. Then Hastings had come in on the conversation and JJ knew why nothing felt right.

 _Emergency involving Emily_ , those were the only words that had registered. The only words she needed before she was suddenly commandeering a jet after a heated encounter with Strauss that left no room for argument from the older woman. She was headed back home to find the love of her life and there would be absolutely no stopping her.

She had changed on the plane and gathered all the information that Hotch had sent her about Ian Doyle. She had Hastings looking into Prentiss’ history with the CIA and was shocked at what was unveiled. She barely had time to let the thoughts seep in. Prentiss had been undercover; she was classified as Doyle’s type and used that to get close to him. She had essentially sold her own body and soul for a case, a profile. They had all been led to believe that Prentiss came off a desk job in the Midwest with the FBI but that had been a lie, just another cover. Maybe they all knew already, somewhere deep down that Prentiss was too damn good at profiling for that lie to have ever been truth. But the JJ before, prior to Afghanistan, was the kind of person to take people at face value.

She couldn’t help but feel that maybe she had been mistaken, that she had been betrayed in some small way by this woman she loved. Those thoughts quickly shook themselves from her head. _No, Emily would have said or mentioned something if she thought it had been relevant. But would she?_ If it had put all the people she cared about, the team in immediate danger then JJ knew her answer. No, Emily would never willingly put her team in danger like that and that had to be why she had walked away so easily.

When she walked into the BAU, it had been with more confidence than she felt. She had lost count at how many times she had attempted to call Emily on the way there but she was there now and she had a job to do, no matter how her insides felt like they could collapse at any minute. It all went by at the speed of light and yet she felt the moments trudging like mud, presenting her former team with Emily’s past had been no small task and Derek looked like he’d seen, no, _known_ a ghost. She couldn’t help but to relate to the feelings herself but this was the woman she loved irrevocably, regardless of past. She loved Emily Prentiss, and Lauren Reynolds was proven to be the ghost.

They had made the connection to Boston and before they knew it, they were on their way to the airstrip to take off. JJ knew that Will was a part of one of the units keeping DC locked down while they searched for Doyle so she knew she owed him a phone call. She quietly excused herself to the back of the plane before they took off and made the call she was dreading.

It rang three times before Will picked up, “JJ, hey, what’s going on?”

JJ sighed as she was about to reveal what she had kept from him, knowing it wasn’t exactly fair but she couldn’t find it in herself to care at that moment. “Hey, Hotch thought I should call and let you know personally that you’re no longer on Doyle watch, he’s already fled the city.”

“Wait, Hotch?” Will sounded genuinely confused now at how she had anything to do with this. “JJ, are you here? Are you working this case with the BAU?”

“Yes,” JJ hesitated after confessing. She knew he wouldn’t be mad so much as worried. Maybe a little upset that she hadn’t made an effort to contact him. “I flew home after we found out Emily was missing be-because I had to be here.”

“Why didn’t you tell me you were back home and working this case?” Will asked with his voice clearly edging with frustration now, essentially repeating his question.

“There was no time for that, Will,” JJ shot back quickly. “As soon as I found out, I came straight back and got to work on the case.”

“JJ, how did I not even know that you were back in the country?” Will questioned while at a loss. “I get that this is your team and all but… you should’ve told me.” 

“Will, I love her, okay?” JJ found herself confessing before she could even rein it in. “She’s my best friend and I have to be here, there’s nowhere else I could be.”

“Look, I get that,” Will sighed, knowing this was one fight he couldn’t win. She knew it from the resigned tone in his voice. Maybe he had known in some small way. “I just, are you gonna be coming home tonight? Are you gonna be able to see our son?”

It was JJ’s turn to sigh now as she chanced a brief glance out towards the rest of the plane, full of profilers, people she loved and adored all aflutter with nerves and anxiety that this situation had thrust upon them. There was no room for guilt, if it wasn’t for the case, JJ would still be in Afghanistan and she’d be nowhere close to her son. “No, look, we’re headed to Boston tracking Doyle and Prentiss.”

“Okay,” was all Will offered in response. There was nothing else to say truly so he left it at that. “Just be safe and I’ll talk to you soon. I love you.”

“Love you too,” JJ offered back before hanging up quickly and the guilt rushed its way forward to the front of her skull once again whether she wanted it to or not. She couldn’t let this distract her though. They had to find Emily and they had to make sure that she was alright.

At that exact moment, Hotch had called her over, saying that they had some security footage that pertained to Doyle and Prentiss. They all watched in shock. Garcia had screamed, voicing what JJ was feeling inside as she watched two bullets hit Emily in the chest and take her down. She was only able to breathe again when Doyle revealed the Kevlar that she had hidden beneath her jacket. She was relatively okay but she was taken. She was now in the hands and at the mercy of Doyle’s ruthlessness.

Derek was still in utter disbelief and voicing it readily. _She threw a flash-bang grenade into a car. She’s lucky the three people inside didn’t die. Is anyone else bothered by that?_

JJ had to be honest with herself and say no, she wasn’t bothered by that. She knew that those three people would probably shoot Emily dead at so much as an utterance from their boss so pardon her if she was finding empathy difficult at this particular moment. She was grateful that Rossi managed to voice his own resolution, _Well, three bad guys_.

Their obvious lead was that Clyde Easter was the mole working with Doyle and JJ ran tirelessly with Hotch, pulling background through Hastings and a few other contacts to try and break him. The efforts were not resulting in much however and they knew something wasn’t adding up. She and Garcia then started sorting back through the information on Emily’s cover and fellow operatives on the JTF team.

The more JJ looked into it, the more it made sense that this was just one of the many reasons why Prentiss was such a damn mystery to everyone who knew her. But it didn’t help curb JJ’s anger that Emily had put herself in such a position to be in this level of danger. Somehow JJ was able to remain calm however, she didn’t know what it was but she trusted Emily and her skills as an agent implicitly to stay alive just long enough for them to find her.

When the team had finally got to the bottom of Doyle’s profile as a family annihilator and Garcia was able to find his son, Declan, and the photos of his supposed murder, JJ didn’t know what to think at first. Reid’s mind was going ninety-to-nothing as he scanned the photos looking for any sort of key or clue, anything that they may have missed. When he pointed out that it was in fact Emily’s hand holding the gun, JJ’s heart sank for all of five seconds; long enough for Garcia to let out a shrieking, “Oh my God!”

Then it hit JJ like a ton a bricks and her head was swinging on her head like a swivel, she knew the truth and she couldn’t hide it, “No, there’s no way in hell Emily is capable of doing this, of hurting a child!”

Morgan looked up at the blonde for a moment, he seemed to be considering what she was saying but she also saw the hint of doubt laced there after learning all that he had about Prentiss in the last twenty-four hours. He was doubting if he ever really knew her at all. But finally he nodded and JJ felt like she could breathe again, he had come to the same conclusion she had, “You’re right so what’s this about?”

“She faked his death,” Reid concluded but didn’t elaborate. JJ’s head was far ahead of him for once however. She was stewing over all they had learned, she knew that the photos were dated around the same time that Doyle was sold to the North Koreans and she finally understood.

“She faked his death to keep him from being a pawn used against Doyle by the North Koreans,” JJ finally voiced what she had managed to piece together. “Emily would never be able to do this to a child, she didn’t care about what happened to Doyle but she cared what happened to Declan.”

“Oh, my little Princess,” Garcia sighed, thinking about all her friend had done just to help this little boy. “I think I just fell in love with you.”

All JJ could think in that moment was _Get in line, Garcia_.

“We got to get to her soon, if Doyle knows about this or she let it slip then he could have already exacted what he thinks would be revenge,” Derek said and just like that he was off. Both Morgan and Hotch headed towards where the SWAT team was already gearing up. She prayed that Emily had been able to stall Doyle just long enough.

When they arrived at the scene where they believed Doyle had taken Prentiss, JJ had never been so frustrated. She wasn’t cleared to go into the building because she was technically only there on loan but she knew that was bullshit. She had walked into hundreds of different dangerous scenarios with her gun drawn at the ready and the fact that she couldn’t be in there searching for the dark-haired woman made her so angry, she was practically steaming as she paced out by SUVs. The seconds ticked by slowly, it seemed to be taking forever as she heard each _clear!_ sent through but it couldn’t have been more than ten minutes before she heard Derek’s stressed voice finally coming through her earpiece.

“I got her!” he announced, breathing a little heavier than normal. “I got her in the basement on the south side. I need a medic!”

The rush of panic that JJ could distinctly here in Morgan’s voice sent a shiver of panic throughout her own body as her hands went to her forehead in the stress of the moment. Her eyes wide, she kept pacing and watched as a medic ran into the building.

She heard Morgan’s words clearly through the earpiece, “Prentiss. Hey, it’s me, I’m right here. You’re gonna be alright. Stay with me, baby. Come on, stay with me.”

Her eyes began to fill with tears as Morgan’s calm demeanor started to shift and he started begging, she knew that tone all too well and she could barely breathe. Then suddenly she heard a small voice, very far away but she’d know it anywhere and a tear finally escaped her eyes as she heard the words uttered, “Let me go.”

“No, no. I am not letting you go. Help me!” At Derek’s clear shout for help, JJ’s heart broke into pieces. “Listen to me; I know why you did all this. I know what you did for Declan. I’m so proud of you. Do you understand that? I am proud of you because you are my friend, and you are my partner. No, Emily! Come on, stay with me!”

 _Goddammit_. JJ was practically wracked with sobs now as she was barely holding it together in front of all the other law enforcement present at the scene. She was breaking, her soul was shattering at hearing Derek Morgan begging and bartering with the woman as if she had any say in her own fate. Suddenly JJ found herself begging and bartering in her own way as she knew now what had to be done. She prayed it wouldn’t come to that but she knew.

“If you can hear me, please just squeeze my hand,” Derek offered softly. “Yes, there you go. There you go, baby. Just keep squeezing.”

At hearing this, JJ breathed a sigh knowing the woman was still conscious but probably not for long. It didn’t take long for the ambulance to arrive and the medics to get her on a gurney and out of the building, Morgan held her hand the entire way out before Hotch stopped him.

“Morgan, I need you here as we need to canvass the area for Doyle,” Hotch ordered leaving no room for argument. She could see Derek was about to protest before relenting. “Go meet up with SWAT and hit the ground running, we don’t have much time. JJ will go with Prentiss.”

At this, Morgan met JJ’s bloodshot eyes and he nodded, seeing the resolution that she held. He knew as well as anyone that JJ would never let Emily go without a fight. Then he was off once again to try and find the sick son of a bitch that had hurt their friend this way. JJ was just about to head off for the ambulance before being pulled back by Hotch as well.

“JJ, don’t tell the hospital anything about who Prentiss is,” Hotch said calmly. “Her identity is to remain strictly need-to-know until we catch Doyle.”

JJ struggled to get the words that she knew she had to out but shook her head, clearing her thoughts. She had to remain resolute for Emily. “What she did for Declan, if you don’t, if we don’t-”

“Yes,” Hotch sighed but agreed before shaking his head slightly. “Let’s just hope it doesn’t come to that, just stay with her and we’ll meet you at the hospital before we make any decisions.”

JJ could only nod and blindly make her way into the ambulance, her hand immediately latching onto the raven-haired woman’s. She finally got a look at the state of her and her injuries. She took in a sharp and painful breath, seeing the stake sticking out of the woman. She could hardly handle the sight but she held herself together by some miracle.

“Come on, babe, you have to make it through this,” JJ whispered as the paramedics were silently working around her. “We’ve got to figure this out, right?”

JJ’s world had never come down so hard on her in a moment and time as this. The team couldn’t track Doyle and so now, she had to do the hardest thing. The biggest lie and crime she would ever commit and that was lying to the team about their teammate’s death. She knew she had to fake Emily’s death because now that Doyle knew, he’d never relent until he got to the raven-haired woman. So JJ cried and she confessed and she lied, god, did she lie. Why was she so damn good at lying?

Her trip back to Afghanistan was delayed due to Emily’s recovery time and what it would take to get her well enough to fly. The worst part of it all is that she didn’t even tell Will why she was home and where she went every single day. She realizes now more than ever that their relationship was built on lies and mistrust and why he never questioned her, she’ll never know.

She spent days and weeks at Emily’s bedside as she waited for her to recover. Somedays she cried, somedays she read Vonnegut to the dark-haired woman and somedays she just held Emily’s hand as tight as she possibly could to convince herself that the woman was still there. That she was still alive. They had even arranged a funeral and Jennifer Jareau surprised herself because she never once released a tear and god, if that wasn’t a tell but most people were too caught up in their own grief to notice.

When the time came and Emily woke up and was told what had happened, she couldn’t disagree with JJ or Hotch that it was the best course of action. It was on par for Emily at this point, spending a few years as herself between secret identities and falsehoods. Maybe both of their lives were a lie and maybe that’s why they were perfect and broken stars aligning so often.

Leaving Emily behind in Paris, after what they went through there and together. What they allowed themselves to feel in their time there was a secret that JJ has rarely let herself think about in years because it was the past and it was a moment of weakness, wasn’t it? No, that’s probably why she hasn’t thought about it in years because it was very real. It was the realest and most alive she had ever felt.

Life from that moment on felt like a dull ache, Afghanistan happened, the pregnancy that wasn’t meant to last and then coming back to the BAU. She put on a façade better than any other person she ever knew and that included Emily Prentiss. She was so good at pretending.

But what got her through was every time that the screenname blackbird popped up and she played another word, even one that JJ knew was not the best option. They were sickening in their scrabble fairytale world, where words like ‘adoration’, ‘infatuation’, ‘love’ and even ‘sex’ all became part of their game. Their little back and forth became the only thing that held JJ together.

Then Emily came back and the games got harder. Lies are easier when they are never revealed. They still played the games but the difficulty level had certainly risen. Their little looks were more obvious than the words on a screen sent from miles away. The sheer fact that they cared for each other, possibly more than anyone else on the team was not something easily hidden. They couldn’t hide their concerns or their fears. They couldn’t hide what they felt for each other but the masks were firmly in place regardless however.

It made it all the more hellish that JJ had to go home to Will every night, she still was great at convincing herself that she was happy regardless of how her heart ached and craved another. The fact that the brunette woman was considering actually settling down and not too far from the blonde was another problem that presented itself and JJ found herself hanging on by a mere thread while the older woman was scraping by on shreds of whatever was left of her life.

Then Clyde Easter just had to throw that job offer in Emily’s face in the middle of a damned crisis negotiation. JJ knew from the moment that she had heard secondhand of the offer that she had lost the woman. The blonde knows without thought that her reaction to this news was the defining moment that would tear her away from the brunette. But Emily had one foot out the door already and she knew probably better than anyone that there would be no stopping her.

Especially since JJ was too much of a damned coward to do anything to offer the woman to stay. She couldn’t just give up the life she had known for nearly five years… could she?

The blonde actually wants to physically punch something when she thinks about it. Instead she gets up and paces the halls of her house again. The walls and photos haunting her as her mind tries to desperately replace all the fake smiles she adorned in many photos with her husband with genuine ones. It was a lost cause however but when she replaces his face with the brunette woman the smiles seem to easily appear in her mind and even now, a bittersweet one graces her face.

JJ spent years hollow and empty without the older woman in her presence. But they played their games endlessly, it wasn’t just word games anymore, it was soft touches in the dark when JJ was alone in a hotel on a case. It was Emily’s soft but deep voice carrying her through to ecstasy and it was dangerous because the time difference meant that the brunette was in her office in London. It was a torrid affair going on in the world’s most elite departments of security.

And when the younger woman found herself at the mercy of who she thought were former allies, her world turned upside down. She thought that she’d never know the meaning of security again, not after repeated beatings, water boarding and after her entire body had been compromised by Askari and Hastings. She knows there’s no hidden meaning in the fact that it is only Emily who she sees so clearly and vividly in her mind. And when the brunette turned into her section chief, JJ nearly panicked but she knew somewhere in her, _she knew_.

And then Emily is there, she is there and she is touching her and she is real. JJ couldn’t relive the moment entirely, she can’t let herself but she feels the weight of guilt of ending up back in Will’s arms when he had nothing to do with her happiness. When he stood by and let his wife be taken, when he hardly had lifted a finger to save her.

But her blackbird, it always came back to her after years and years, the woman haunted every fiber of her being. She thinks about how Reid called Emily around the year anniversary of her torture. She knows that Emily knew exactly what she needed to face the monsters in her dreams, to face the demons that threatened to take her down, mentally, physically, spiritually. Emily put that file in front of JJ so indirectly because she knew that JJ was strong enough to face it, even when she didn’t feel strong enough in herself.

 _How_ is all that JJ keeps playing in her mind, how had Emily always been there even without physically being present? How had they still carried on this connection that never ceased with an ocean between them? How is it that JJ could lay next to her husband and feel nothing and yet still feel her heart beating out her chest when she thought about the brunette?

How had she let Emily slip in and out of her life, returning from London only twice but still manage to let her leave again? Every single time there were touches and kisses and longing in both of them. JJ had even managed to have another child and yet she still could not shake the undeniable ache in her bones for the older woman. Nothing ever could, she realized then but didn’t accept it.

JJ went to the shooting range when she heard that Emily might be involved with someone else. It was ridiculous, she knew because she was the liar. She was the one with the happy family façade that she didn’t even know how to shake anymore because she wasn’t happy, not without Emily.

And then god, Emily came back. She was back and for good and she was their unit chief. JJ respected the fact that Emily had Mark but somewhere along the line Mark was no longer part of the conversation. He disappeared as easily as many things in the brunette’s life did. JJ thinks it’s possible that Emily didn’t know how to commit and maybe that was part of her makeup that terrified JJ. But somehow, they always found themselves wrapped up in each other whether it be glances or in hotel sheets.

This time was no different and when Reid was imprisoned, she found herself lost again and letting the brunette guide and ease her back into their crimes. Her crimes. She doesn’t know how she’s lived with herself all this time cause now, when the assistant director was threatening to take the job away from the brunette, JJ was faced with the loss again and she doesn’t think she could handle it this time. She could not survive losing her a third time.

And the Taveras case hadn’t made it any easier, cases involving infidelity were never simple ones for the blonde because she knew she was just as guilty as these victims. But she was barely keeping her head above water now, all the wrong choices and pure lies and dishonesty. JJ is almost certain she couldn’t breathe because of it. She feels her chest tightening; the web weaving in her mind was blocking air from making its way into her lungs. She knew that she couldn’t be a coward anymore. The blonde allows herself this moment of what if’s and regrets to take her down, to send her spiraling cause she deserved it. But it would only be momentarily, she had to be brave because she could not lose Emily again.

Not ever, no matter what.

Somewhere in the blur of her panic attack she had landed back on the couch and passed out. She doesn’t know how exactly but she was there. JJ only is awakened by the sound of heavy feet hitting the ground around her and she stirs from her slumber. She knows who it is instinctively. She knew that Will didn’t exactly have a quiet bone in his body in the morning.

She allows herself to take in her surroundings, the sunlight barely above the trees outside. It sets an orange glow over the room and her skin. The blonde has never felt more like a prisoner but she feels the universe has shifted slightly on its axis. The only thought running through her head that mattered anymore is that _I can’t lose her, not again_.

So she musters the strength, she finds her legs and allows them to move towards the kitchen at a steady pace. She knew what she had to do first because she could not go one second without being honest, not anymore. Not after everything, she had lied and faked her happiness too long. She needed the real thing and maybe it was the lack of sleep but she didn’t feel the fear anymore.

JJ found her way into the kitchen, her legs as heavy as if they were in quicksand but moving steadily regardless. With the boys still tucked away, it left her and Will alone, together, like so many days before but JJ knew that this morning would be different. It had to be different. She didn’t have a choice or say in the matter anymore.

"Will, can we-can we talk?" JJ stuttered through the numbness of her insides to the tip of her tongue.

"Of course, chére," Will says while setting down the mug of coffee he'd just made. "What's going on?"

"This is so hard to--" JJ struggles and she hates how Will just looks up at her from under his brow, expecting but with the patience of a saint. "Will, I think- I think we should, uh..."

"Separate?" the single word left Will's mouth with a calm evenness that she wasn't expecting. She is significantly caught off guard to say the least. She had expected him to maybe offer counselling of some sort, to try and fix what was broken but never this.

"Yes, but how-"

"I wondered when this was gonna happen," Will utters with a shrewd smirk. He raises his wrist to check his watch for the date, time. "A little over a year after Emily became Unit Chief seems about right."

If JJ was surprised before, now she’s entirely shocked, stunned still and silent. Words come out fumbled on her next attempt, "Will, how did you know?"

"Honestly, I think we've both known that something hasn't been right with us for quite a while now," he laughs humorlessly. JJ hadn't expected him to quite avoid her question, the one that so easily put the blame for their failure squarely on her shoulders. "I may be a good ole southern boy but I’m not stupid. We're both pretty passive, just go with the flow kind of folk but I guess you can't do that anymore."

"No, I-I can't," JJ slowly shakes her head, meeting Will's eyes for the first real time since the conversation had begun. "When did you know?"

"A long time now, Jay," Will offers with a shrug. "Nothing's been right since that day Emily _died_."

"That long?" JJ's eyebrows can't help but elevate quickly. After all this time and he _knew_.

"I thought it was just grief for a while and then she came back and you, you never looked so alive in your life," Will says with a genuine smile. "But the light faded, it wasn't enough... for either of you."

"Will," JJ begins but he calmly raises a hand to let him finish.

"Then there was the bank robbery and the two unsubs and everything happened so fast," Will shakes his head slightly. "I thought that maybe it had brought you back to me so I married you because it’s what I thought we both wanted but then Emily left right after and you spiraled. I don't even know if you know it but you did. Hell, I half expected you to up and follow her to London."

"You know I couldn't have done that to you and Henry," JJ says firmly.

"You're doing it now," Will doesn't miss the guilty look that passes his wife's face. "I think when I _knew_ was when Prentiss commandeered the damn Interpol jet, took that flight all the way here and saved you while I was just sitting on my ass in protective custody. I don't think we ever came back from that."

JJ just nods in agreeance and shrugs.

"I gotta ask though," Will starts and hesitates before resolving to continue. "How long has it been with you, for her, I mean?"

"Honestly? Since before you…" JJ inhales sharply and sighs. "And I want to tell you that I am so sorry and I know how selfish and unfair I've been to you. That's why I'm doing this because I can't be unfair to you anymore, you deserve to be happy."

"But you're also still being selfish because you deserve happiness too, you know?" Will says with a lifted eyebrow, just gentle enough to be accusatory.

"Yes," JJ says and the tears start forming in her eyes as she shuts them.

"Have you and her ever...?” Will doesn't even have to wait to finish the words to his question to have his answer as JJ once again guiltily looks away but he needs to hear this. "Jesus, JJ."

"You remember me telling you after she came back that I was the handler who dropped her off in Paris with her assumed identities?" JJ asks, hoping to stir some kind of memory.

"Yeah," Will sighs, trying to calm himself for what he was about to hear.

"Well, the IDs took longer than expected to come through and I ended up spending the weekend in Paris with her before returning to Afghanistan," JJ tells truthfully. "And it just, it happened."

"Before we were even married, huh?" Will says with slight disbelief, he doesn't let himself feel the anger bubbling quietly below the surface. He remains steady and even and it nearly infuriates JJ cause he deserves to feel and let that anger out, directed at her in specific.

“I am so sorry, Will,” is all she can say. “I never meant for it to happen, it just did.”

“You can’t help who you fall in love with, JJ,” Will offers and just nods some kind of blind resolution. “I just wish maybe you’d shown some self-control, told me but we also wouldn’t have Michael if you had so actually, I guess I don’t wish that you’d told me.”

JJ watches Will’s expression closely, she can’t help the second nature of profiling every emotion that passes within seconds from shock to betrayal to regret to just some sort of acceptance. “As hard as it’s been at times, I don’t regret anything with you, Will, our time together and our boys.”

"It's just strange because after Hastings and Askari, I really felt that you stopped trying to let me love you and after a while, I think I just did," Will shrugs as he lets himself reveal his honesty. "I don't think I've felt more than physical attraction and friendship towards you in a long while, JJ."

"Is there... someone else, for you?" JJ broaches the possibility. Maybe that was why this had been so amicable thus far and she hated how she felt relief that this could make everything slightly easier. If she wasn’t the sole one to handle the blame but she knew all too well that it fell squarely on her shoulders.

"Yeah, I mean, she doesn't know," Will says with a nervous shake of his head. JJ doesn’t miss the guilt on his face and she’s never felt so much like an unsub because for all her mistakes in this, she didn’t regret any of it truthfully, the lying and cheating, just the pain. "I ain't got the kinda nerve that you do, I guess."

JJ ventures a brave hand to cover her husband's and offers, "You should tell her because you deserve the woman you truly love, someone who can love you in all the ways you deserve, you know that?"

"You do too, JJ," Will flips his hand over and their palms meet and fingers tighten in a grip. "I don't mean to make you feel like you don't, Emily is wonderful and I'm sure she'll be a wonderful edition to Henry and Michael's lives in a different capacity."

"You- You mean that?" JJ asks, skeptically. She could not help be unsettled by the calm resign in his eyes.

"Of course, I do, chére," he smiles. "I can't say I understand the woman but that doesn't mean I can't see how she's good for you, I know she cares much deeper than she shows. I saw that at Union Station."

"She does, she definitely does," JJ nods, glad Will can see that the woman she loves never meant for all of this to happen. It was never a plot to ruin William LaMontagne’s life. 

"What's more is that I saw something in her eye as she was disarming that bomb," Will shakes his head, bewildered for a moment. "I don't think I've ever seen Emily Prentiss just let go and when she did, all I saw was the fact that she was doing this out of love for you. She was there to save a life, do her job, sure but she was doing it to save _my_ life specifically because she thought she was saving _your_ life."

JJ picks slightly at her nails, her head downcast as a tear finally slips from her eye, "You know, both of you have never really talked about that and I read your reports but-"

"She loves you, JJ, and you deserve a love that you can return," Will says finally, avoiding any talk of the trauma that he and Emily went through. It’s the strangest thing to think that somehow he feels a slight connection to the dark-haired agent as well but he does. He can’t help but feel grateful; he got to watch his boys grow up because of her. "I will support you just so long as we keep joint custody of the boys."

"Of course, Will," JJ says, reaching to squeeze his hand again. "I could never take your sons away from you, they deserve their wonderful and amazing father in their life and Emily and I wouldn't have it any other way. She cares about you too in all this, believe it or not."

He laughs a rueful laugh again, tears shine in his eyes but he smiles, “I somehow don’t have a hard time believing that, Jay… I mean, that woman… You forget I’ve known her too and even after… I know she’s selfless and I know how much she’s done for us, for you and even me, I just- I owe her a lot.”

“Will, you don’t owe her anything and Em definitely doesn’t see it that way,” JJ says a little confused at the turn in conversation. Where was this coming from?

“I owe her my life, the time I got to spend with you and our sons’ lives too,” Will thought seriously and JJ shakes her head, realizing now. “She was the one that made you come to your senses, even if it was a little twisted, we owe our relationship, Henry and Michael wouldn’t be here if she hadn’t pushed you. I feel some sort of warped gratefulness that I got that for all it’s worth now, I guess. I can’t hate her.”

She sighs, the tears return with ferocity to her eyes now as they slip from her lids to her cheek and she wipes them away just as quickly. “I do love you, Will, and I didn’t lie when we got married and I promised that I always would but it’s just different, it’s not the same and it’s not what I thought it was.”

“You don’t got to say anything, Jay, I know all that,” Will said with a genuine teary smile of his own. “So… where do we go from here?”

“I- I honestly don’t know… this isn’t the way I saw this conversation going exactly and I figured-” JJ cuts herself off, shaking her head at the incredulousness of it all.

“You thought I’d kick you out?” Will asks with confusion, maybe a lining of hurt.

“Well, that is usually what happens when a husband finds out that his wife cheated on him,” JJ says like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. She knew Reid could probably spout the statistics off the top of his head. “That was the best case scenario really, I mean with what we see unsubs do every day…”

“You thought I’d hit you?” Will’s confusion quickly turns to a flash of anger before relenting to offended.

“What? No, no, I mean, I don’t know, Will,” JJ trails off, trying to grasp what she will had thought but it doesn’t really matter, she knows, in the long run. “I guess there was no way of predicting how this would end up really and my job prepares me for the worst case.”

Will just shakes his head firmly, despite the disbelief that his wide, bugging eyes relay, saying, “I could never do that to the mother of my children, Jay. Never and I hoped you’d know that. I’m not some unsub who-”

“I do know that,” JJ confirms that she had, of course she had. “I just- I had to prepare myself.”

“Look, you can stay here and I won’t kick you out of your own bed even…” he offers, desperately grasping at a change of topic which he hopes is successful. “I’ll sleep elsewhere.”

“No, Will, I don’t want you to do that but I’d like to sleep in the office,” JJ says with her own resolve. “I don’t think I can- Not after everything that’s...”

Will sighs, his heart stinging a little with the intonation in JJ’s voice, “You don’t want to feel like you’re cheating on her, do you?”

JJ looks at Will seriously, so seriously that Will is confirmed in his suspicion but he’s not really sure that he’s surprised. She only offers his name in response, “Will…”

“No, no, it’s, um, okay,” he chokes out, realizing the emotion was swelling from more than just his eyes. His heart leaping in his throat and he feels an unreleased sob settling itself there. He clears his throat and nods, “I get that you want to do this right with her now.”

“How can I possibly do that when I’ve already…” JJ feels her own emotions finding its way up her neck, the guilt choking her and memories flooding before her eyes so much that she has to close them to get some sort of release. “I’ve screwed up so much when it comes to both of you. Hell, at times, I- I couldn’t even figure out who it was that I was actually cheating on and it… I realized that it was both of you.”

He watches as she avoids his gaze, he senses it’s the guilt but he knows by her refusal to meet his eyes that it’s more than that. It’s the fact that it had always been her cheating on Emily and never the other way around despite the official state of their relationship.

“Your heart belonged to her a long time ago, JJ,” he admits. “I think I know that, always known it, somewhere. It hurts like a bitch to hear it but it doesn’t make it any less true.”

She finally meets his irises again and he stares into the deep blue sea that is all the emotions in this woman finally open to him, honest and sincere for the first time since he can even remember. Her voice cracks slightly as she offers again, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. Not really. We can’t regret anything,” he offers back, struggling but knowing that what he was saying was true as well. “It brought us two boys and this will all work out for the both of us too, it will just take time to find the new normal but we’ll figure it out.”

JJ sighs, she hates that this man has to be right and that they’ll all have to endure the pang of this new reality but instead, she voices another reality, “I never deserved you.”

“Don’t do that because I can’t do that,” Will offers with a croak of his voice, wishing his emotions would just stay in check. “So look, I think we should tell the boys until tonight cause there’s no reason to draw this out.”

“You amaze me and honestly, I don’t think I could’ve asked for a better father for my boys,” JJ says sincerely, in slight awe. It will be difficult and not just for him, she knows. “Thank you, Will, for everything.”

“It was the easiest job I ever had but…” Will just shrugs his shoulders and looks over at his wife, well, soon to be ex-wife and sees how she’s already withdrawn from their conversation. How her body language is pulling away with every second that passes. He didn’t need to be a profiler to see that this woman was missing a part of her at the moment and it shot something similar to an ache through him. “You can’t stay and I get your reasons.”

JJ’s heart suddenly ached more than it had throughout the entirety of this conversation. How had she been so lucky to have people like Will and Emily in her life? What had she done to deserve this selflessness in the people who love her after only causing them so much pain? She’s not sure if she could really feel it at the moment while still in his presence. “Will, it just doesn’t seem fair.”

“JJ, I learned a long time ago when I lost my dad just how unfair this life is and it’s unfair of me to ask you to remain unhappy,” Will says seriously. “I could never do that, you being happy makes me happy and I just got to figure out what I’m gonna do now.”

She hesitates before asking what she does next but she had to, for both their sakes, “Are you gonna tell her too?”

“I- I’m gonna need some time,” he relents. “Real time to adjust and get myself to a place where I’m ready but I will get there.”

“I love you so much and I only want you to be happy too,” JJ says without even really thinking, making her way over to Will and into an easy embrace. The hug seemed to be filled with tension but also she could feel the slightest hint of relief on her part too. “I don’t even know how me and her are gonna make this work, I haven’t even told her and with all the investigations going on now…”

“Just tell her, JJ,” Will offers a small smirk as he pulls away from the embrace. He’s a little stunned when JJ lands a kiss on his cheek as she pulls away as well. “Don’t lose her again.”

“I have to get ready for work and I don’t even know- but it doesn’t matter,” JJ says with a shake of her head, looking back at Will in the eyes. “Thank you.”

“No, thank you,” and he just can’t hold back the emotion from his voice anymore. He looks down shyly to avoid it however. “Go on, get, I’m kicking you out now.”

JJ just smiles and with one last lingering look, she walks away. The blonde knows now, not exactly how but she knows she’ll never let herself lose the brunette woman again, not over her dead body. She doesn’t care about the trials now that she was facing due to her crimes. She would face them head-on because she knows that only redemption can lie in her future with Emily by her side.

And she would fight with every atom that made up her star for the center of her gravity, Emily Prentiss. No matter how long it took.

**Author's Note:**

> okay, there you have it, folks. better late than never, huh? after nearly six months of trying to perfect this fic, i think i realized it will never be perfect at least until it's canon. but i think this is a pretty decent effort despite the ending being kind of weak. either way i hope you enjoyed it!
> 
> the title of this fic was inspired by the song '9 Crimes' by Damien Rice.


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